Devan Shimoyama, Assistant Professor of Art, was awarded the 2016 Miami Beach PULSE Prize at PULSE Miami Beach. Founded in 2005, PULSE Contemporary Art Fair is an established part of the annual art calendar, running concurrent with Art Basel Miami, and is recognized for showcasing some of the most compelling contemporary art being produced today.

Shimoyama transformed the booth of Los Angeles’s Samuel Freeman Gallery, texturing black walls with black banana leaves, hanging bedazzled white swings from the ceiling, and surrounding the viewer with his self-portrait paintings. Shimoyama has said of his work, “I renounce the notion of one’s body belonging to oneself. My body, inhabited by my spirit, serves as my home in which I maintain and utilize his functionality in order to navigate the world. He becomes a portal for the viewer to enter and undergo a symbiotic relationship with him in his exploration of magic and self.”

Shimoyama joined the School of Art as a Visiting Professor in 2014 after receiving his Masters in Fine Arts from Yale University. He was promoted to full-time Assistant Professor in 2015 and teaches courses across Drawing, Painting and Print Media.